


The thousand-headed dragon

by Liena67



Series: From the end a new beginning [12]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Adlock, Death, F/M, Kidnapping, Love, Pain, Parentlock, Rage, Revenge, Thriller, noir
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-19
Updated: 2018-09-13
Packaged: 2019-06-29 21:45:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 18
Words: 17,588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15737928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liena67/pseuds/Liena67
Summary: Sixth long story of my series originally written in italian language and now translated. I recommend reading my previous stories in this series.After the fourth season.Sherlock loves London considering his territory, but for a series of circumstances he will fight and hunt in a territory unknown to him. A new and implacable enemy will upset his life to stop him. A tough and ferocious fight in which Sherlock finds himself in search of the most terrible dragon so far encountered."It is as if there was an indefinite and unassailable plot that goes through their entire lives, preventing any possibility of having even a simple normal and banal holiday, but then none of them loves or craves the normal".





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> rated mature for some scene at the last chapters of this story

**New York - South Bronx - 3 March 2022 - 9.30 p.m.**  
  
Paulette knows that a girl like her, just fourteen years old, should not go around alone in the evening in these streets, where the few lights of the vandalized street lamps just light up the sidewalk, leaving the narrow alleyways between the buildings totally dark.

But she is not a girl like any other. Paulette, with her black skin and long raven hair, is the sister of the most feared gang leader in this part of town. No one would ever dare touch her, even look at her except with due respect.

And Paulette takes advantage of it, she feels like a little queen of this little world, free to dress up with shorts and t-shirts on a physique that already at her young age almost resembles that of a woman. But the girls of the Bronx grow before all the others. They do not live under a glass bell, like those in the tall Manhattan skyscrapers.

They live on the street and if you live on the street you have to grow up fast if you want to survive. But Paulette knows she has something more than any other. Because she, unlike many of her friends, has decided that she wants to study, she wants to become a doctor, she wants to leave these streets where she feels the queen but at the same time they take away the air and make her feel prisoner.

Paulette wants to fly, wants to see the world and to do it she must study. It happened all that day a few years ago, when one of her friends had been stabbed by a rival gang member right in front of her eyes. And in front of her eyes she saw paramedics saving her friend's life.

Here, that day she decided she wanted to be a doctor and make sense of her life. But in the meantime, she can even go out in the evening with her friends without being accompanied by her brother or one of his henchmen.

Because she is the queen of these streets. And that's why Paulette smiled when a car approached. That's why she still smiled when a man got out of that car and approached her. That is why on her face the smile was replaced by amazement, when the man caught her in his arms by plugging her mouth.

That's why Paulette thought it must be a bad taste joke when she felt herself thrown into the car. And then nothing more, Paulette did not think anything.


	2. Chapter 2

**London - Heathrow airport - international flights - 7 March 2022 - 10.00 a.m.**  
  
It is not the first time that Sherlock finds himself looking at the board of flights departing Heathrow. It is not the first time, nor will it be the last one probably. He does not like to get far away from his London, because this city he knows it as his pockets, is his den, his personal hunting ground. In the streets of London, he knows how to move, he has his homeless network, his personal hounds, always ready to help him, in exchange for a nice bunch of pounds. But there were the years when the hunt took him around the world, those terrible and lonely years spent dismantling the network of Moriarty, a vast network and spread everywhere in the world.

Heathrow saw him leave secretly, disguised and with another identity. Heathrow saw him lose, when he fell into the net that Irene had cleverly woven around him, and win when she was then harnessed. Heathrow saw him leave to go and save her to Karachi. Heathrow saw him come back, relieved and elated to have succeeded in the enterprise, intimately confused by all those questions that remained unanswered.

But never Heathrow had seen him ready to leave for a holiday with his family, as if they were a normal family.

Sherlock sighs and crosses his gaze with Irene at his side.  
"We're still in time," he says in a low tone of voice so as not to be heard by Miki.

The boy, fifteen years old, now taller than John, with his brown hair left long and rebellious on his shoulders, the black bandage on the missing eye, a few steps away from him looks at his smartphone while with the other hand holds the small Mary, who at just over a year and a half of life, already would like to run everywhere.

"Stop it, take a deep breath and you'll see that everything will be fine," Irene replies with a slight smile.

"It will be a nightmare... two whole weeks to do the tourists... I think I'll go crazy" he replies, rolling his eyes at the thought.

"You promised him, you cannot back off. He spent eight or nine years of his life locked up in a cell, he endures our follies, takes care of his sister without ever complaining and his leisure is spending hours in the laboratory with Alex and now with you when you're on a case. He needs to see a little bit of the world and do something normal like a holiday," Irene tells him, always keeping a low tone of voice, so as not to be heard by that serious, brave and smart boy who now really considers as his son.

"I know I know. This will not prevent me from feeling like in a nightmare" Sherlock answers nodding "anyway, when you see me ready to explode, please remind me of all this," he adds, pointing to the billboard where the gate of their flight has now appeared. Without saying anything, he approaches Miki and takes Mary in his arms.

"Let's go, crew... it's going to be a very long journey," he says after printing a kiss on his daughter's cheek.

"And since when would you be the captain?" Irene asks, walking beside him.

"Always, what a question" Sherlock replies with an ironic smile, ignoring Irene's vaguely puzzled expression as they cross the gate that will take them to the plane and to America.


	3. Chapter 3

**New York - The Manhattan at Times Square Hotel - 8 March 2022 - 6.00 p.m.**

Irene has always loved traveling the world. It was her habit to take long vacations, before she met Sherlock, and the subsequent years of exile, hiding from those who wanted her head, often took her to America. And New York is America as well as Manhattan is New York.

She personally chose the hotel where they are and now, sitting on a large armchair in the fifteenth-floor suite, she admires the lights of this sparkling city through the large window, while sipping a glass of wine dressed only in a bathrobe. In fact, she had not been making a proper holiday since she had returned to London, since she had decided to combine her way with that of Sherlock, a road that until then had only traveled parallel to her, intersecting for a few moments. Perhaps more than Miki it was she who needed to breathe a different air from that of London and that of their home in Eaton Square or that at 221B of Baker Street.

Not that the life with Sherlock is monotonous, at all, indeed the exact opposite, because the personal drug of Sherlock are his cases and the more complicated and dangerous they are the more he throws himself inside. But her personal drug is that man, and it is a moment to be in the whirlwind of that life so dangerous, but so full of adrenaline and emotions. And maybe that's why they all needed a vacation, away from London and everyone. A moment alone and only for them, a moment to live a bit of normality and then return, happy, to their crazy and inconceivable life, the only life that both of them are able to live.

The door of the suite were open and distracts her from all these thoughts. Sherlock puts the key and the coat on a bench at the entrance and approaches her, crouching at her side until resting his hands on the arm of the chair.

"Did you find the nicotine patches?" she asked him, arraging a tuft of hair that fell on his forehead.

"I had to shoot a bit but then I found them... interesting city this one... there is a human and chaotic variety very different from the London one" he replies, kissing the palm of her hand and then catching it in his "Where are Miki and Mary?" he asks when he sees that they are not in the suite.

"Miki wanted to see the gym on the twentieth floor and then walked around the hall where there are PCs and tablets available to customers... I think he wanted to upload the first photos he made on his Facebook profile and greet John and the others. I needed to take a shower and then he brought Mary with him," Irene replies, placing the glass of half-empty wine on the table by her side.

"And do you think he'll be back soon?" Sherlock still asks, putting his lips on the inside of her wrist.

"Did you have something in mind, Sherlock Holmes?" she asks him, arching an eyebrow, but at the same time feeling a jolt that crosses her at the touch of those lips that now know her most sensitive points very well.

"A couple of little things... just to cheat time," he replies, continuing to rise with his lips along the vein of her arm to the crook of the elbow.

Irene sighs, biting just one lip. Then, without saying anything, she gets up from him and looks at him for a few moments, before smiling at him with her captivating and particular way.

"Now I'll take you to our room... so let's clarify for a moment that story of who the captain is," she says, reaching out to him.

Sherlock looks at her, raising an eyebrow, then smiles and, without saying anything, takes her hand and follows her, because he knew that this sentence would not have gone unnoticed, but perhaps it was precisely because of what he had said.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------

For Miki all this is incredible. The first time he saw London, the first time he found himself outside the dark cell where he had spent most of his childhood, the world already seemed vast as he had never imagined. Until then he was just a nameless child, a distributor of organs for that abominable trafficking of which he was a victim. Since his escape, everything changed and now he has a name and two surnames, he is Miki Adler Holmes and he is tremendously proud of it, because even if the world considers Sherlock and Irene two crazy, he knows them well and loves them immensely. But he never imagined that he could see a city so impressive, incredible, glitzy, chaotic and colorful like New York, when London was already for him the best.

Sitting in front of one of the PCs available to customers, Miki, with her little sister Mary in his arms, tries to upload photos to his Facebook profile. That is not easy, because to make Mary stand still he should be tie her. She definitely has the same hyperactivity as Sherlock, but also the determined and powerful character of Irene. Making her do something she does not want is almost impossible, just as it is unthinkable to keep her hands away from the PC keyboard.

"Let's go, Mary do the good... so I'll never be able to" he whispers as he tries to hold her hands still with one arm to use his free hand on the keyboard.

"I want see Uncle John," Mary exclaims in such a confident tone, that almost Miki was about to immediately open the page of John to satisfy her.

"Do you need help? You seem to be in trouble" a female voice behind him almost makes him jump. Miki turns around and there's a girl standing behind him. He looks at her with his one eye with such an intense look and looks for details to understand something about her, as Sherlock started to teach him.

She must be more or less his age, maybe a year younger. A little shorter than him, dark, smooth, long hair, an olive complexion, perhaps South American. Most likely Mexican, because it reminds him of Eleonor, Lieutenant Eleonor Mendoza, now a companion of John, who was the first policeman with whom he spoke after his escape.

Miki still looks at this girl with hazel eyes big and intense and when she suddenly smiles at him, for a reason that does not understand, he feels suddenly dry throat and a sudden feeling of heat, as if they were in full August and not at the beginning of March. He opens his mouth as if to say something but it is as if he had lost his voice and could no longer speak.

"Hi, I see Uncle John!" Mary exclaims again, whose blue eyes are now fixed on the new arrival.

"Hello to you, baby," the girl replies laughing at the liveliness of Mary and also for her determined expression.

"Yes, yes Mary is fine, now we open the page of Uncle John... I'll upload the photos tomorrow" Miki intervenes, finding the voice that he believed to have lost.

"My name is Isela, anyway," the girl tells him as she sits at his side. "Oh yes, Miki... my name is Miki and she is my terrible little sister Mary" Miki replies, without being able to look away from the girl while in his mind he repeats her name finding it incredibly musical.

Mary draws his attention again and with a sigh Miki opens the Facebook page of John hoping that this distracts her. He scrolls through all his last posts looking at the photos but with the corner of his eye he continues to watch the girl by his side, who seems instead focused on an internet page. He sees her sigh and bite a lip with a frowning expression as she reads, and then he turns his gaze to the desktop of her computer. He recognizes some chemical formulas and understands that this is some task that she must do.

"Maybe, well, if you want... I can help you" he says, trying to get the most detached tone possible.

"Would you be able to do it?" Isela asks, turning to him with a look now interested "I do not understand anything about chemistry. My mother is not able to help me, you know, she works here, settles the rooms and has never studied these things" the girl adds and there is no shame in her voice in describing her mother's humble work.

Miki crosses his gaze with hers and now she looks more beautiful than before.

"Of course I can, open a file, I told you the solution and I'll explain it" he answers with a sure tone now, happy to be able to show his intelligence and ability, a feeling that until now he had never tried.

Isela smiles in response and Miki now seems to fly, to be on the twentieth floor of that hotel and no longer downstairs.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------

"How they survive with this food is a miracle" Sherlock whispers while still exploring the restaurant menu of the hotel where they are now.

"Said the man who lives most of the time of fish and chips," Irene replies, taking the menu from his hands giggling.

"It's not true, sometimes I eat something different," he replies, narrowing his eyes.

"Yes, air and cases to be solved" she tells him while with a simple gesture of her hand she call the waiter and orders for them three fillets and simple meat ground for Mary, then chooses some good red wine for her and Sherlock.

"Did you say hello to John?" then Sherlock asks to Miki, when the waiter goes away, trying to distract him from the smartphone that tonight he does not seem to want to leave, which is unusual for him because, contrary to many teenagers, he uses it for the bare necessities.

"Mmm, yes... no... sorry what did you say?" Miki replies, looking up from the phone for a moment, but soon a light signals a message arrived and already he returns to look at the screen.

"Nothing important" Sherlock tells him, leaving him alone while spending time begins to observe all the other guests sitting at the tables of the restaurant, deducing every detail as always.

"Did you meet someone today, Miki?" instead, Irene asks in an almost indifferent tone.

"Mmm, yes... no... yes, someone" Miki replies, continuing to write on his phone's keyboard.

"Isela is nice!" suddenly Mary exclaims.

"Isela... I understand," Irene says, smiling as she fixes one of her daughter's dark curls.

Miki does not answer and does not look up, but a sudden blush appears on his face.

Sherlock returns to watch the boy and then meets his eyes with Irene, whose smile tells him everything. And for the umpteenth time he admires her particular ability to understand human emotions and desires in just a few moments, just as he manages to deduce from a single glance all that a person has done and is about to do. He smiles for a moment holding Irene's hand and hopes with all his heart not to be forced to face certain speeches with Miki, because this would be for him a titanic enterprise, impossible and with sure catastrophic consequences.


	4. Chapter 4

**New York - The Manhattan at Times Square Hotel - 9 March 2022 - 11.00 a.m.**

"Isela and Karina Ruiz... that's what I told you... Isela is fourteen and Karina is only thirteen and they can't have escaped... they would never do it" the woman's voice, while talking to the two policemen in the lobby, is tense and almost hysterical.

"Madame, calm down... we are not saying that they have escaped, but only that they are only a few hours and perhaps you are worries for nothing" one of the two policemen answers, as he looks at her sighing without ceasing to chew the chewing gum, that perpetually carries in his mouth. It is neither the first nor the last time that they are called by Hispanic, South American or black parents because their daughters have disappeared, and then they find them to get some reed or worse with some of their friends, or maybe locked up with their boyfriend. These girls grow up too fast and know one more than the devil, the agent thinks as he writes the girls' names on the notebook and notes them for the next report.

"They are good girls... they study and they do not have bad acquaintances I assure you... they would never have gone without notifying me" the woman's voice is almost a cry and the last words echo in the hall of the luxury hotel, attracting the attention of some guests who seem also annoyed.

At that moment the elevator opens and Miki comes out of it, managing to perceive the woman's last words. He approaches trying to understand what happens and looking at her, he recognizes the same features of Isela's face. Sensing that she must be the mother of the girl, he proceeds towards the policemen and the woman.

"Madam, I told you to calm down, now we have all the data and your number, let's make a report in the central office and if we have news we call you, be quiet, go back to your job and see that your daughters will be back in a while" the policeman insists, closing the notebook and, after a wave to the other agent, they go away leaving the woman alone in the hall.

Miki watches her who covers her face with her hands with a resigned and desperate expression, and then she turns around and almost runs away. He stands still in the center of the lobby for a few moments, then quickly turns around and rushes back to the elevator to return to their suite. Arrived on the fifteenth floor, he almost does not wait for the elevator doors to open completely and already runs along the corridors. He then opens the door and closes it behind him, almost violently, running inside the suite.

Sherlock is sitting in one of the armchairs, checking his laptop, while Irene in their room is finishing up preparing Mary. When the boy enters Sherlock looks up at his clear agitation.

"What happened?" he asks him by closing the laptop and getting up to meet him.

"I do not know, something happened to Isela and her sister" the boy tells him and his voice is agitated, frenetic.

"Explain better," Sherlock asks, narrowing his eyes. Miki is not a boy who agitates easily. At just eleven he had the strength and the coldness to escape from his cell and face and shoot one of his executioners, when the man was about to shoot Sherlock. And he is not stupid, he has an intelligence above the average with a Q.I. higher even than his. If Miki gets agitated, there must be a serious reason and therefore Sherlock is ready to listen to him carefully.

"It was early this morning that Isela did not write to me and she is not even connected... it seemed strange because she told me that she never turns off the phone and then we had to have breakfast together, because she had other tasks to do and I could help her. She also wanted to introduce me to his sister" he begins to tell by talking fast "then I went down to see if I found her where there are computers and there was her mother with two policemen", Miki says.

At that moment Irene appears from the bedroom with Mary in her arms and approaches to listen.

"Did you hear what they said?" Sherlock asks again.

"Yes... the mother says that they disappeared but the policeman told her that it was normal and not to get agitated... I think he is convinced they ran away on their own... but I think he is wrong" Miki replies with a sure tone now.

"What makes you think the cop is not right?" Sherlock asks him.

"Because Isela would not do that... I'm sure... she would not leave without telling her mother and she would never turn off her phone, please... We have to do something... those policemen will not do anything I'm sure" Miki tells him with a tone of supplication.

Sherlock sighs and looks up at Irene who after a few moments simply nods.

"Miki, I don't know anyone here, it's not like in London that I can ask Greg and intervene on a case" Sherlock begins to say, not knowing how to move.

"It's not true... someone we know and you also have his number" Irene intervenes, resigned to see her holiday as a simple tourist finish in a moment "call him... maybe he can help you" then adds without no regrets, because she also knows Miki and knows that he is not mistaken in his innate ability to understand people. And if there are two girls in danger, there are no holidays.


	5. Chapter 5

**New York - Vincent D'Agosta's office - 9 March 2022 - 4.00 p.m.**

Lieutenant Vincent D'Agosta is not a policeman who loves bureaucracy and paperwork. He is a man of action, he loves being on the street or otherwise being busy, investigating some important case. He's no longer thinking about his career, more precisely since he met the special agent Pendergast, since he became, no one knows how, his best friend. Because Pendergast has involved him more than once in his personal cases, cases outside of any rule and logic, and to help him he found himself with a series of suspensions and complaints that have blocked any hypothetical career altogether. It is already true that he was able to return to the NYPD and to his role as a lieutenant. But anyway, in his family it's enough the brilliant career of his wife, captain Laura Hayward, who never goes out of the rules and helps him to stay inside rules as long as possible. To tell the truth Laura, in spite of herself, began to appreciate the so-called Pendergast method, but not for this reason she embraced it and made her own.

And now, after a whole day dying of boredom in the compilation of verbal banals, his friend Pendergast is there in front of him.

Sitting on the other side of the desk, dressed as always as a gravedigger, as Vincent sometimes tells him because of his suits, even if of expensive tailoring, the special agent Aloysius Pendergast is looking at him with those deep and disturbing eyes, his aristocratic beautiful face framed by short blond hair almost albino, and the light complexion just lit by a slight smile. And next to him that British investigative consultant, with whom they worked in London about two years earlier, during the case of suicide-murders.

"Then Sherlock... I'm really glad to meet you again... but I honestly never thought I'd see you sitting in this office asking me to investigate a case of the disappearance of two little girls" Vincent tells him, crossing Sherlock's clear eyes, no less intense than those of his friend.

"Dear Vincent... I know we are asking you something special... but I have talked about it with Sherlock and also with his son Miki. You know that I do not usually intrude in such cases, but you also know that my intuition, like that of our friend, is hardly mistaken. I believe that Miki and the mother of the two girls are not mistaken in thinking that the disappearance is not voluntary".

Vincent looks at Pendergast and squints his eyes for a moment. It is true, his intuition is almost never wrong, just as he almost never mistakes his friend hacker, and he is ready to bet what he wants that Pendergast will not take long to stick his nose in the minutes of the two policemen and social profiles of the girls. But he avoids saying it. Sometimes pretending not to know can be healthier, especially for his stay in the police.

"So... let's say... we want to believe that the two girls did not disappear voluntarily, in which case we must think that they were kidnapped, but they are two girls daughters of a Mexican widow, who works as a cleaning lady in a hotel. It's impossible that the reason is a blackmail, if so, the hypotheses could be worse... but we do not have elements to start from".

"Instead we have them" Sherlock intervenes, who until then had not yet spoken "we know with certainty that Isela was in the hotel safe at least until five in the morning, when the mother got up and left the room to start her work. And we also know that at six o'clock she was still writing with Miki and connected with her smartphone, something must have happened since then.The hotel service cameras are not active in that part of the hotel where the servants live, but Isela and her sister must have gone out. The vocal message they sent to Miki suggests that they were on the outside. We start from that point and see where we arrive... but to do it Vincent I need your help, because this is not my territory" Sherlock tells him finally.

"Okay... let's see where we can get" and said this Vincent gets up starting to arrange the photos of the two girls on a blackboard. The game begins.


	6. Chapter 6

**New York - NYPD section of Manhattan - 10 March 2022 - 11.00 a.m.**

Agent Jim Foster chews his chewing gum as usual. By now it could be said that it is a nervous tic, but it allows him to unload the stress of this job that he has not loved for too long, or maybe he has never loved it, to want to say it all. He never had career purposes, he mainly cares about bringing home the salary with the minimum effort possible.

That's why at the end of the day the section of Manhattan is the one he prefers. Here, for most of the time, when he does the turn in the street, at most he is dealing with some drunken riches. And when it's okay, it's a nice rich woman, one of those with whom you can have fun a bit if in return you forget to do the report.

Agent Foster did not choose to be a cop by passion, he just needed to work and it seemed like a good opportunity. Not to mention the fact that sometimes that feeling of power that he feels does not mind. Of course he would never work at the Bronx, but not even at Harlem or Chinatown. He is not brought for action and luckily everyone knows it. But the most boring thing is verbal, stupid paperwork to fill even when it comes to nonsense or time wasting. Not that it takes a long time to fill them out. Just write a couple of things and the report is made, so much so the archivist reads, because the cases that rely on him are just cases of shouting or stop for driving while intoxicated.

Well, then sometimes from lack of staff, it can happen to get something like that of the two missing Mexican girls. But in fact, just because they are Mexican. Otherwise they would surely send some detectives and not just two simple agents like him and his partner, who works just since a month. Anyway it wasn't complicated, even if he was forced to write a bit more in the report.

Agent Foster enters his membership section after changing into the locker room in the basement and heads for his desk. Because for the seniority, he is entitled to a desk, although more than anything else is a table with an old PC and some file placed in a corner, just before the printers, so hidden that sometimes he falls asleep after lunch and no one notices him.

That's why now Agent Foster almost frowns in surprise at seeing a man sitting at his desk and moreover sitting right in his place while using his computer.

"But who the hell are you and what are you doing with my computer?" he asks aloud, approaching menacingly.

"I'm reading your reports... it seems obvious to me," Sherlock answers without even looking up from the pc.

"But what? First of all, how did you do it, since it takes a password to enter our system and then how do you allow it?" the voice of Agent Foster is increasingly altered and almost swallows his chewing gum.

"And you call this a password? It took me no more than three seconds to understand it, and my daughter, who is a year and a half, could pick a harder one," Sherlock replies, continuing to read the minutes to the PC.

"Ok now I got tired, this is a violation and now do you know what we do? I arrest you and we do not talk about it anymore", Foster told him, taking the cuffs from his belt.

"And then what will you do? A beautiful record like the one that drew up for Isela and Karina's disappearance? I thought Scotland Yard boasted the most incompetent and ignorant of the agents, but I was wrong" Sherlock replies without changing tone as he prints the reports that he found.

Agent Foster thinks he might be able to shoot him directly at this arrogant son of a good woman, who does not yet know who he is and where he came from.

"If you're thinking of shooting me, I suggest you change your mind, first of all because you would not be able to do it and then because I do not have time to waste with these things" Sherlock tells him as he stands up to take the printed sheets.

"Sherlock" the voice of Vincent D'Agosta behind them stops the hand of the agent Foster who was already thinking of pulling the gun "I see you are making new friends even among the policemen in New York... what happens? Now you are so used of Scotland Yard that you do not have more fun?" he asks in an ironic but authoritative tone, that obtains an immediately calming effect on the agent.

"Lieutenant, this man has snuck in here and even in my PC and now he has printed some reports" the agent tells him to justify his altered state.

"Yes, I know, he's authorized to see the reports... he should have warned and asked to see them, but apparently he preferred to do it himself," he says, turning to Sherlock.

"I do not like the waste of time... so I did before and I also found something very interesting" Sherlock answers, barely raising an eyebrow.

"And it would be?" Vincent asks, now intrigued.

"It would be that I confirm the incompetence of the agent Foster, but he is in good company... there are at least a dozen agents like him who have made the same mistake" Sherlock answers, taking the printed files.

"What exact mistake?" Vincent is now definitely perplexed.

"That of reasoning on prejudices, without looking beyond their little nose and brain" Sherlock answers, and now Agent Foster thinks that yes, he really wants to kill him.


	7. Chapter 7

**New York - Vincent D'Agosta's office - 15 March 2022 - 6.00 p.m.**

The blackboard in Vincent's office is now a tangle of photos, notes, question marks marked with a red marker, names, dates, ages of dozens and dozens of girls. All more or less of the same age, all of lower middle class, all disappeared and dates for dispersed but all filed as probable voluntary disappearances.

Because it works like this in this world and also in this great and glittering city. When you're nobody and you do not have white skin, few people join the dots and understand the truth behind appearances.

And now, before the eyes of Sherlock and Pendergast, there is an abominable painting that is being painted.

In the last days, thanks to the hard work of the two and the help of Mime, the hacher friend of Pendergast, they have reconnected, for similarity of type of victims, dozens and dozens of disappearances occurred in the last year in New York but also in Washington. Big cities with large suburbs. The union of all these dots has triggered an official investigation of the FBI, which fortunately, or for interventions from above, was entrusted precisely to Pendergast.

"I still do not know what it is, but the hypotheses are among the worst I fear," Sherlock comments aloud watching the blackboard.

"Any hypothesis you have in mind... believe me my brother... it's not as terrible as reality" the ice voice of Mycroft Holmes comes from behind them.

"What are you doing here?" Sherlock asks, turning around to catch the eye with his brother, beside whom now there is also John Watson.

"I have a diplomatic engagement in the city, John told me about the case you are following, that he wanted to join you and I was kind enough to bring him to you... you could thank me sometimes" Mycroft replies, looking up at the sky.

"It will be for another time... Hi John... you did well to come, I need your help," he says to his friend and is not surprised to see him. He was almost certain he would reach him, even if he had not asked it.

"And when ever you do not need it" John answers with a smile, then approaching Pendergast and Vincent to greet them.

"Well, brother... what do you know about this story?" then Sherlock asks, without bothering to introduce him.

"What I know is that you'd better keep away from this story... this is really dangerous people, their network is perhaps even higher than Moriarty's... certainly more ferocious and inhuman," Mycroft tells him as he approaches that blackboard full of photos.

"Do not bore me and tell me what you know"

"At MI6 I have been behind this group for a long time, but they still have not managed to flush out all their contacts, reproducing like the tentacles of an octopus, like the heads of the Greek mythological serpent Idra, whose central head looks immortal. At MI6 they had fun with the names, they gave this group the name of Hydra, as that criminal group of those Marvel comics" begins to explain Mycroft.

"What a funny guy" John ironically twirling his eyes at the choice of that name.

"The fact is that this group has in fact a leader that nobody can find, and among the many illegal activities they have a power plant that finances all their activities, especially the terrorist one. They kidnap girls... they take them to barracks in the middle of nowhere... they rape them for days... months... until they are so devastated in their minds that they become perfect and remissive prostitutes" Mycroft's voice is now almost a whisper and with a sigh he returns to look Sherlock "This is a dragon that you can not defeat little brother" he says with a sigh.

"I am a dragon's killer... remember it" Sherlock answers without hesitation.

"The fire of this dragon could burn you before you can get close... it is certainly already in alarm for the investigation you are doing. He has heads everywhere... listen to me for once and let it be", says Mycroft with a sigh.

"Go to your diplomatic appointment, brother... you've already got too tired, I see it" Sherlock answers in a harsh tone of voice, turning back to the blackboard.

He still hears him sighing behind him, saying goodbye to everyone and leaving the room, but he does not care what his brother has to say and his protection desires. In front of him there are too much poor girls in the mouth of an evil dragon. And that dragon must be taken as soon as possible.


	8. Chapter 8

**New York - Hydra headquarters - March 16, 2022 - 11.00 p.m.**

Her hands tremble, they tremble so much that she can hardly hold that half-broken glass from which to drink a little water. But she does not have to waste a single drop and Isela wants her sister and that black girl to have a bit of it too.

She does not know how long she's been in this place, she does not even know where dhe is, barely remembers what happened. The last thing she remembers was the vocal message she had sent to Miki and then the dark.

And it's dark even now, because in these few square meters, where they are, she sees almost nothing. She only feels the cold floor under her feet and the bars, that prevent them from escaping.

Every now and then a little light comes, when one of those men brings them a drink and some stale bread to eat. But she closes her eyes, because the feeling of nausea and terror is enough to hear those voices in that language she does not understand.

Isela slowly passes the glass to her sister and then to the girl. They're so scared that they do not even dare to talk and so she does not even know her name. But moreover, what would it matter now? None, she only hopes that this nightmare will end soon, because she is afraid to forget also the name of her sister and perhaps her own name.

 

Umar Dudaev throws the phone across the room angrily and angrily, causing it to end in a thousand pieces. In front of him the men who await his orders seem to sweat, because when Umar sees things go wrong, he often unleashes his anger at the first that happens to him.

Despite being just over thirty-five years old, Umar has made a name for himself in the environment and built himself a killing after killing, taking out the obstacle with his own hands. Because Umar has two goals in life and both wants to reach them. Being at the head of the largest and most feared criminal group has ever seen and helped the cause of Chechnya free and independent, although sometimes thinks that he remained among the few to want and want it.

But Umar does not give up, he never gives up, as apparently does not seem to want to surrender this damned English detective, who has decided to ruin all his plans for action. The Mexican girls with the Bronx girl are still there, because that detective has made everything more complicated. And Umar really hates when something that should be simple becomes suddenly complicated.

"This damn must be stopped, it risks blocking all our traffic and we can not afford it... The girls do not last long and must be replaced with others... if we stop, everything stops" he says to the men in front of him.

"Tell us how we have to move then Umar... we can do it easily. He does not even go around armed, even if he is often in the company of that policeman and federal agent" says one of the two men and Umar, when he hears him, approaching him and violently punches him directly on the nose, making him fall bleeding to the ground.

"But what kind of stupid do I surround myself?" the voice of Umar is altered and angry "if we kill the detective we will have all the police in New York and the federal on our tracks" exclaims spreading his arms "and then, there is that federal with him, that has a very bad reputation... I would not even so sure that fools like you would be able to get them out," he adds, returning to his desk where he sits, passing a hand over his short dark hair.

"No... we have to stop him in another way... we have to cut his legs... metaphorically speaking... we have to make him wish he never came to America" he says, clapping a hand on the table and preparing to make understand to that stupid English who's in charge in this city.


	9. Chapter 9

**New York - Riverside Drive - Manor of Pendergast - 20 March 2022 - 5.00 p.m.**

Irene looks in the mirror of the large bathroom near their room, in this huge manor where they have moved from the day before. The holiday now was already over, even before almost beginning, and strangely she is not surprised. It is as if there were an indefinite and unassailable plot that goes through their entire life, preventing any possibility of having even a simple and ordinary holiday. But then, none of them loves or craves normality. Certainly not her, who for a lifetime has made the unconventional her personal modus vivendi. And the same can be said of Sherlock, of Miki and probably also of little Mary, who began her complex life even before being born two months in advance.

Yet right now, just at this moment while looking in the mirror, Irene would not want to be what she is, not be Irene Adler Holmes, but just any Irene in love with any Sherlock. But it is a thought so fleeting and fast that it almost can not even materialize in her mind, only a shadow in her eyes.

The voice of her daughter coming from the lower floor distracts her and then leaves the bathroom, stopping to take the leather jacket from her bedroom. She decided to take Miki and Mary out for a walk, before dinner in a restaurant where Sherlock will join them, and a blue jeans with a shirt, jacket and elegant yet comfortable ankle boots, are the most suitable clothing for both.

She descends the stairs and reaches the library where they are all gathered, stopping on the threshold to observe them. John is seated at a desk in front of a laptop, Pendergast is seated on an armchair in front of the fireplace, checking a series of records he keeps in his lap, and Sherlock is leaning over the large rectangular table, where a little map full of red marks has been spread, that combine the various points of abductions.

He is explaining to Miki by his side his reasoning, while Mary, sitting on the table between them right in the middle of the map, as usual, seems enchanted by the voice of his father, while not understanding anything he is saying. At least that's what Irene believes, even though this child is so precocious and perceptive that she would not be surprised at all if she could understand a few sentences. She certainly learned to speak very soon, even if her words are still obviously limited.

Sherlock finishes talking and looks up to meet her and how each time Irene can not help but smile and remain chained by those eyes. Ironic, she thinks, for someone like her who for a lifetime, in her profession as a dominatrix, has used real chains with her clients.

"Are you sure you do not want me to accompany you?" Sherlock asks, staring at her standing there in the doorway, beautiful and seductive, even dressed in a casual manner, her hair loose on her shoulders and framing her face.

"Just take a walk, stay here, see you later at the restaurant," she tells him as she approaches.

"Sherlock do not worry, do not interrupt what you're doing," Miki adds, then taking Mary off the table and heading for the door. He knows how important it is not to distract him and so many days have passed since Isela disappeared. If he can do something to help him, in his small way, he does it without any doubt.

"Ok, go ahead then, at least enjoy this walk, see you later" Sherlock answers, greeting the boy and the baby before they leave the room "I promise I will not be late," he then tells Irene a step away from him.

"It's all right," she tells him, and suddenly she feels the desire to hug him. She clings to him and the words come out before she can stop them, those words that the two of them never feel the need to say.

"Wiliam Sherlock Scott Holmes... I love you" she whispers in his ear "and I know that you are able to flush out and kill that dragon" then she moves to his face and kisses him softly.

She then stands smiling at his vaguely puzzled look and without saying anything else she goes "but do not be too late, we have a table booked and I would not want to lose it" she adds then, coming out and returning to have that tone of voice so sure that distinguishes her.

"I'll be on time, I promise," Sherlock tells her before she disappears. For a few more seconds he stares at the library door and then shakes his head and clears his mind, returning to focus on the map in front of him.

That dragon, that damned snake with several heads is there somewhere and he wants to find it, he has to find it.


	10. Chapter 10

  **York - Greenwich Village - 20 March 202New2 - 7.30 p.m.**

It was a nice walk through luxurious streets full of shops of all kinds, buildings so high as to seem almost swallowing you and at the same time they look like they can touch the sky.

Irene spent these hours almost serenely, enjoying the simple company of Mary and Miki. It was necessary to get distracted for a while, forget that investigation, those poor girls and the terrible fate that they went to meet, forget that wherever they go, there is always a puzzle to solve, a spider to flush out, a dragon to kill. And the hours have passed in a moment, perhaps too quickly.

The taxi where they are now is taking all of them to the restaurant where they have an appointment with Sherlock in about an hour. It's early, but it does not do anything, moreover with the traffic that is there now probably will not arrive before an abundant half-hour.

Mary is sitting between her and Miki and does not stop moving to try to look out the window, fascinated by the lights and huge billboards that illuminate entire walls of buildings.

The taxi finally turns into a side street, where the restaurant they have chosen is located. A place that is not too crowded and not very touristy. A quiet place, where people go to eat the dish of the day without excessive pretensions, but without sacrificing taste.

The taxi slows down, starting to approach the sidewalk to stop behind a big hatchback with darkened windows, but does not have time to stop the car that they see descending a series of men threatening menacing.

Irene looks at them and squeezes the door handle with one hand while she hugs her daughter with the other and a single thought is formed in her mind at that moment.

"The time has come... now it's all over," she whispers slightly, with no one else to hear.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was among the most difficult to write up to this point.   
> It could be a trauma for you to read it.   
> But it was all necessary, trust me. If you arrive at the end of the story you will understand why.

**New York - Riverside Drive - Pendergast villa - 20 March 2022 - 8.30 p.m.**

Time is a strange concept for Sherlock. Sometimes he runs fast and yet he seems to be still stationary. It's what happens to him when the mind is totally taken by a case, a puzzle, a puzzle that he can not solve. His gears are in continuous motion and in his mind are formed thousands of hypotheses with all their possible consequences up to discard those wrong and remain with the only probable. It is a process that a normal mind would take days or perhaps months to process, but it takes only a few hours. Only in his perception of time have not passed hours but just a few minutes.

He is therefore disappointed that he looks at the clock, realizing that he should already be at the restaurant by now.

"Damn it... I promised to be on time," he exclaims aloud, attracting the attention of John and Pendergast, both taken from their research and analysis.

"You can take my car, the keys are in the hallway," the agent tells him, looking up at him.

Sherlock nods and picks up the phone to call Irene, to warn her that she's coming, but the phone is turned off. Strange thing because she never leaves it off. At that moment, Pendergast's telephone rings and he looks at him.

"Dear Vincent... tell me that you have discovered something interesting and you have some good news to give me" the agent says, standing up from the chair and putting the speakerphone.

"No, no my friend, unfortunately I have no good news... indeed the exact opposite" D'Agosta's voice, although amplified by the speakerphone, turns out to be almost gloomy.

"Explain better... what happened?" Pendergast asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Here... it's about Irene and both the children... there's been an... accident..." Vincent's voice is now even more gloomy than before, if possible.

"Where... what?" they are the only words that the agent can say, while he looks at Sherlock, whose eyes are now wide open while his face begins to lose color.

"At the restaurant... the one where they had to dine... just out here..." Vincent's voice is interrupted by a muffled moan of Sherlock, who seems to recover and quickly exits the library running towards the exit.

"Pendergast... but was Sherlock listening?" Vincent asks, realizing only now that he was in speakerphone "oh my God... do not let him get here... they are dead... they are all dead... do not let him see this mess," he exclaims on the other side of the phone, but he received no answer, because Pendergast has already closed the communication as he runs to the exit with John.

 

Sherlock does not know the streets of this city well, but has an excellent photographic memory combined with an incredible sense of orientation. But anxiety is gripping his heart and clouding his mind and he has had to correct the direction several times, losing precious minutes.

"Answer me... for God sake, answer me Irene" he exclaims when he tries again to make her number, finding her again unreachable. The hands around the steering wheel tighten almost to lose the color and when the light turns green Sherlock starts to run off the Pendergast car, whose acceleration is remarkable. Twice he takes the wrong way and finally manages to find the right one, but it is not the name of the street that convinces him that this is the restaurant where they had an appointment. With almost breathless Sherlock approaches, looking with horror in his eyes at the column of black smoke, rising from a charred car, entirely surrounded by firemen, policemen and paramedics. Eyes wide open, eyes almost in trance, lips parted in an attempt to breathe, Sherlock with slow movements, as if suddenly he lacks strength, opens the door of the car and descends. Slowly he finds the strength to take a few steps and recognizes Vincent's figure among the policemen around the car, who as soon as he sees him, almost runs to stop him. Sherlock does not look at him, his eyes are fixed on that car and on that white sheet, that covers the back seat under which there are clearly some bodies.

"No... no, please... no... tell me it's not true" the voice suddenly returns to him as almost a scream and seems to awaken his body from that numbness. With a shot he runs forward to get to the car but is blocked by Vincent who almost plates him.

"Let me go... leave me I told you" Sherlock yells at him to pull away from his grip. "Sherlock stop... do not go... it's better that you do not are, believe me" Vincent tells him continuing to hold him down with difficulty, although he is a massive man, but the desperate force of Sherlock is something that can not contain and he is going to escaping non, when even Pendergast and John arrive, who catch him by the shoulders and arms.

"Let me go... let me go to them I told you!" Sherlock's voice is now a desperate cry, as his strength is, and John can not do anything but make him lose his balance until he falls to the ground face down, while they keep him still. He does not tell him anything, what could he ever say to him. He just keeps him still to prevent him from moving, because what they are seeing now is too much for him too.

"Let me... please let me go to them... John please... Irene... my children... please!" Sherlock screams again with an altered voice that gradually goes down to be little more than a suffocated and harrowing cry "please... please... it's my family" he just manages to say and his voice is so desperate now that the entire neighborhood seems to have become silent as a sign of respect for his pain.


	12. Chapter 12

**New York - Riverside Drive - Pendergast mason - 15 April 2022 - 3.30 pm**

John finishes the call with Eleonor and puts the phone on the table in front of him. The Pendergast villa's library is now the room where he spends most of the time during the day. He gets up from that chair only for a while, when he goes to check Sherlock, now closed in that room upstairs for almost a month.

They are keeping him alive almost by force, through injections of supplements and minerals, because he totally refuses to drink and eat. He spends his time on that bed in an almost fetal position, he does not speak or answer any questions. John is now convinced he is closed in his mental palace and no longer wants to leave. But they do not give him a single moment.

In turn he, Pendergast and Vincent check that he does not go out to look for drugs or worse. They emptied the bathroom near his room of any sharp object, but the truth is that Sherlock almost does not leave that bed. To see him get up would be a good result already.

Sighing John closes his eyes and again that terrible image of the carbonized car and those bodies under the sheet makes him breathless. He still seems to smell the smoke and burnt flesh. They prevented Sherlock from approaching, but he had to do it, he had to see and never forget the vision of those bodies, Irene, Miki and little Mary. It almost feels as if his beloved wife Mary had died so twice. In time, John had learned to love Irene in recent years and was very attached to both Miki and Mary. He knows what it means to lose the woman you love, to see her die in your arms, but he can not imagine what his friend is feeling now, because losing a child must be something even more atrocious. And he lost two, because Miki was now for Sherlock like a son. He almost wants now to call Eleonor again to hear her voice again, like that of his sons, Rosie and William.

The noise of the entrance door of the villa distracts him and he gets up waiting to see Pendergast enter.

* * *

The hyperbaric cradle, yes in her room, in Mary's room that he built in his mental palace, there is also the hyperbaric cradle, where his daughter lived her first months of life. She was not even seven months old when she was born, she was so tiny, he could almost keep her in one hand, but he could only look at her in that cradle. Her room is still small, but slowly he was filling it.

A room next to Irene's and Miki's. Because Sherlock has built in his memory a room for each of them. And it is so comforting now to spend there the time, he can almost forget that dull pain that takes his breath away. And in that of Miki there is the chessboard, the one with which he taught him to play, the one with which he managed to get in touch with him and helped him remember where they held him prisoner. Now Miki has become so good that more than once he has risked beating him.

But now he is there again, in Irene's room, caressing every dress, every object, her whip, symbol of her strong and dominant part, her telephone, a symbol of her heart even for the password that she herself had chosen. And the edition of the Taming of the shrew, the one she read that night on Baker Street, in that first moment of genuineness that she had shown him, but also that which she gave him and that reminds him of their first real kiss.

And here she is, back in front of him, even if only in his mind, who whispers those words again, those that they had never really said, because they did not feel the need, those that he never told her.

Sherlock looks at her and listens to her again as she tells him _"I know you're able to flush out and kill that dragon"._

He opens his eyes, the building fades, they vanish and the pain again drives him mad. But that phrase now echoes in his mind, continuously, almost like a loop. With difficulty he gets out of bed and, with heavy legs, he reaches the bathroom looking in the mirror. He looks perhaps even worse than when he was stuffed with drugs during the Smith case. The face dug and almost colorless, long beard, dark circles. He hardly recognizes himself and perhaps she or his children would not recognize him either.

He returns back to the bedroom and takes his phone from the bedside table. He turns it on and for a few moments he almost hopes to hear that sound, that particular ringtone for her messages, but the phone remains silent. He opens her contact, reads the last messages and almost smiles, even if his eyes are shiny and tired. Then he decides and composes one.

**Sherlock:** I love you... and I will kill that dragon for all of you.

* * *

Aloysius Pendergast knows well what it means to lose someone you love and to see her die before your eyes, because he has seen his wife Helen die. He knows how harsh it can be and knows how such a pain can take you one step away from death. If it had not been for Viola and Vincent now he would not be here, but he would have died of an overdose, because the pain was unbearable.

That's why he ordered Sherlock to be under strict surveillance in his house. Not in the hospital or alone anywhere, but here, where all of them can keep an eye on him. He does not know if Sherlock can manage to recover, but at least they can keep him safe. He has not known them for a long time, he did not know them, he corrected in his mind, for a long time, but he had immediate admiration for that woman, so courageous and self-confident, intuitive and witty, as well as that boy with particular intelligence and that child, who so much remembered the traits of both parents. Only heartless monsters could make such a small child die like she was.

Sitting in his armchair, he sips his absinthe and looks at John in front of him.

"I do not know what to do with Pendergast, I'm afraid he can stay in that catatonic state for life," John is telling him as he sips a glass of whiskey.

"You know him better than me, John, although he certainly has never dealt with something like that before and so we do not know how he can react," the agent replies.

"Yeah, that's for sure, maybe I should take him back to London, among his friends and his world," John adds with a sigh.

"We will not go anywhere now" Sherlock's husky voice interrupts them making them turn around. He is standing on the threshold of the library, dressed and washed even if his beard is still long. John gets up suddenly and so does Pendergast.

"I'm about to start a hunt and I want to know if you're with me" Sherlock continues in a steadier voice passing from one to the other "but I warn you immediately... this will be a war without prisoners" he adds and his eyes are now so cold and full of rage to be disturbing.

John looks at him for a long time in silence and thinks of those charred bodies.

"We are soldiers... and soldiers do not take prisoners" he replies with a sure tone.

"Never taken prisoner in my life," Pendergast replies, and his pale eyes are cold as ice.

"Well... let's get to work then... we have a dragon to find" Sherlock adds, entering the room and letting the pain turn into a blind and furious rage.


	13. Chapter 13

**New York - Riverside Drive - Pendergast villa - 5 May 2022 - 10.00 a.m.**

Twenty days, twenty days of hunting at full speed. Twenty days of hard and unscrupulous war. The fury, the deep desire to flush them all out, opened Sherlock's mind and he saw the plot in their abductions. Because people never act randomly, there is no randomness, the mind unconsciously acts by always following its own pattern. And obviously the pattern was always dictated by the same head, the dragon at the head of everything, who ordered where and when to take action to kidnap poor girls.

And the war began, because they managed to predict the neighborhoods of action of those monsters. They were stationed for days, checking the movements of all the girls that corresponded to the target of the kidnappers, passing from one district to another, failing to prevent the disappearance of another girl, but in the end they intercepted one.

And from there the war started. No prisoner, even if the Pendergast method was very effective to get information from each of those monsters, captured one by one. Places where the girls were kept locked in the woods far from the city, dens of those in charge of abductions, shelters where weapons were kept.

And the dragon started to get scared, because the kidnappings were completely interrupted. But the thread of the skein was now caught and one by one the heads began to fall. Twenty days since he left his mental palace to start the dragon hunt.

And now Sherlock is sitting there in the library and staring at the phone on the table in front of him. He found it, he turned it on, he heard and saw the message that he had sent her twenty days before, and he can not do anything but fix that phone.

"What are you doing?" John's voice seems to come from afar and Sherlock slowly raises his eyes, looking at his friend as if he did not see him.

He does not answer, looks at him for a few moments and then returns to fix the device in front of him.

John looks at him and also moves his gaze on the phone, recognizing it as Irene's. He closes his eyes sighing. That's why they had not found it in the car's remains, she had forgotten it somewhere in the house. He opens his eyes and sits in front of the friend, waiting patiently for him to say something, hoping he will not go back to lock himself in his mental palace as twenty days before.

They remain silent for almost a quarter of an hour, until Sherlock reaches for Irene's phone and puts it in the inside pocket of his jacket. Then he looks up at John and seems to see him only now.

"We have to do more quickly... there are still a few heads left but we have to get to the main one... Come on John... we can not stop... those girls need us" he says and his voice now seems even more determined and angry.


	14. Chapter 14

**New York - Manhattan - Hell's Kitchen - June 15, 2022 - 7.00 p.m.**

Once the Hell's Kitchen district, also known as Midtown west, was an area inhabited mainly by the Irish working class. Since the nineties gradually the neighborhood has abandoned that popular feature and today, as in almost all of Manhattan, rents have grown, thanks to the proximity to Broadway. But Hell's Kitchen still has a large area of infrastructure and warehouses and although many are now used for the business district, some are still abandoned and isolated.

And it is at the entrance to one of these warehouses that Sherlock, Pendergast and John are now located. From this war they voluntarily held out Vincent, or at least from the practical part, accepting only his help in finding information and addresses. But here on the field they could not involve him too, already too many times he risked his life and work and would not willingly accept a war without prisoners.

And now they are there, in that warehouse where the dragon is hiding. They surrounded him, man after man, den after lair. In that warehouse there is the headquarters of the criminal group and the main manager of all this hell in which Sherlock found himself, the head of all those broken lives, because none of those girls, even if survivors, will never again have a life that is not a continuous nightmare. Those who found in the shacks outside the city had the mind and the body devastated by violence. It will take years, perhaps, to get out of it. But among them they found neither Isela nor her sister and perhaps they are still prisoners there, where they are brought after the abduction. Probably the chase started by Sherlock has stopped their circus and he hopes only to find them alive and healthy. It was a promise made to Miki and he wants to keep it.

In silence, all three move after having put the two guards out of the game in a clean and efficient way, so as not to alarm anyone who is inside. In that part of the warehouse there are the cars and before moving, they cut the tires at all means, to avoid any escape, closing the entrance with a bolt and breaking the key inside the lock. No one has to escape easily, none of those monsters must be saved.

Like a pack of hungry and perfectly organized wolves, with their own ferocity, they move all three through the various areas of this warehouse and whoever they meet is silenced, mercilessly and without scruples of sorts. No mercy for those men without heart and without soul, no pity for the dragon that Sherlock is now observing, hidden a few meters away from what must be his office.

 

Umar is angry as he never thought he could be. Sitting in front of his laptop, he is looking at the reports of all the houses of arms and men who have vanished into thin air. An impressive series of accidents that only those stupid policemen can not recognize as a precise and punctual attack. He has not even come out of this warehouse for days, almost as if he were afraid of that damn English devil. Yet the terrible death of his family should have destroyed him, he was sure that he would stop that way. A clean job by the way, despite not having to intervene personally. For a while it had also worked, but then began the disappearances of his men, the fires in the arms depots, the disappearance of the girls and then, miraculously, reappeared in the hospitals. And Umar began to feel the network tightening around him. This is the worst mess he has ever been in, but he has every intention of getting out of it, at the cost of killing that detective with his own hands and then starting a war against the feds. Umar does not want to give up and does not want to lose.

Suddenly a muffled sound draws his attention and looks up at the open door of his office. The penumbra does not show anything unusual, but his senses are in alarm. He realizes that the two men, usually positioned in front of his office, have disappeared. Slowly, he then moves his hand to a drawer and, after opening it, extracts a gun. At the very moment when he lifts it up in front of his, from the gloom, like a ghost, that damned Englishman appears and Umar, for the first time in his life, tries what terror is.

Sherlock moves quickly as soon as he sees the man pointing a gun at him. As a fury he enters the office, managing to dodge two shots, and when Umar is ready to shoot again, Sherlock raises his right arm, in the hand of which appears an iron bar, and tightly clamping it, he hits the arm of the man, making fly away the gun from his hand.

Umar screams, more for anger than that pain, and pounces against him trying to hit him with the weight of his whole body, but Sherlock is not surprised and after having avoided him with even more force, he grabs the bar with both hands and hits, hits, he hits several times, with a cold ferocity that not even he imagined he possessed, until Umar no longer makes a sound, remaining motionless at his feet in a pool of blood.

Now Sherlock looks at this animal at his feet and the bar still in his hands. He has a breath of breath, eyes that look like two cracks and the adrenaline rushing through his veins. No remorse, no mercy, except for those poor girls who are victims of these monsters.

"It's over... you can leave it now" John's voice at his side makes him turn and he looks at him take the bar from his hands and throw it in a corner "we found them, come with me," and then they hear Pendergast's voice coming from the back of the warehouse and they both join him.

In a cage, almost skin and bone, there are four little girls and among them Sherlock recognizes, from the photos he had seen, Isela and her sister. They open the cage and slowly let them out, talking to them in a calm voice so as not to scare them.

Sherlock takes Isela's hand and tries to smile at her. "Hi Isela... I'm Sherlock" he stops for a few seconds as if he were not breathing "I'm Miki's father. I promised him that I would find you and take you to safety" he adds and when he sees the girl smiling despite the tears and the still terrified look, he embraces her "now it's all over," he says in a whisper.

 

Two hours later they are all out of the warehouse and they watch while the flames are destroying it, thus erasing every trace. Vincent arrived with an ambulance and took the girls away without investigating how they found them. The important thing is to have found them, he said to himself, while imagining what could have happened in that warehouse.

Pendergast gave his version of the facts, an anonymous tip, the discovery of the girls, their escape and the kidnappers who fired, to try to stop them, and then took full tanks of the cars, that exploded and transformed in a moment the warehouse in an open pit. After all, the agent is the owner of the FBI investigation and none of them will ever dare to say the opposite of what he said.

Sherlock still looks at those flames that rise high in the sky and for the first time in months he feels the appeasement that has led him in this fight, in this war. But not the anger, that is still strong and present in every molecule of him, he feels it flowing as if he had replaced his own blood. The phone rings and he takes it looking at the display.

"Mycroft... the news gets you fast, even in this part of the world" he tells his brother without taking his eyes off the pyre.

"You killed the dragon at the end" he hears him say on the phone.

"Yes, I did it... because I'm a dragons killer... and you know it" he says in a tone so cold and icy that Johm, at his side, turns towards him with a perplexed gaze.


	15. Chapter 15

**New York - The Manhattan at Times Square Hotel - three months before - 12.00 a.m.**

Irene is arranging her things in suitcases, after having already put Mary's away. In the afternoon they will move to the mason of Pendergast, in order to allow a more constant work and proceed with this investigation on the disappearance of all these girls. The agent's villa is large and he has reserved for them a beautiful room with a large bathroom. In this way, she can help them and at the same time stay with Mary.

Miki has come down with Mary to talk with Isela's mother, he wants to let her know that they are taking care of the disappearance of her daughters, but he does not know anything about the child prostitution network, in which the two girls have fallen. There was no need to tell him and put more anxiety on him. He only knows that there are many other kidnapped girls. Of course he is not stupid, rather the opposite, and something tells her that he is already imagining the worst. Irene just hopes Sherlock can find them before it's too late.

A slight knock at the door distracts her from these thoughts. Perhaps it is the laundry service, with their clean and ironed clothing. She squeezes in her dressing gown and goes to open the door and who she sees leaves her surprised.

It's not the laundry service, nor any of the hotel staff, it's not Miki who forgot the keys or Sherlock returned earlier than expected. In front of her there is Mycroft Holmes, the only person in the world who never thought of finding in front of her bedroom door.

"Good morning Mycroft, Sherlock is not here," she says, rediscovering her voice.

"I'm not looking for him... I need to talk to you," Mycroft replies, and this time his tone is not sarcastic and sharp as ever.

Irene looks at him suspiciously, then moves and lets him in. Closed the door, she shows him the armchairs in front of the windows. She lets him sit down and, crossing her arms over the breasts standing in front of him, she looks at him.

"What do you have to tell me, Mycroft?" She asks and something inside her already tells her that she will not like his answer.

* * *

Irene looks out of the window the city so full of life, the yellow taxi seems the main note of color and from the top it seems like a single snake that moves apart. She turns to Mycroft, after listening to him, who is still sitting.

"You're crazy... you cannot ask me something like that" he answers now looking at him angrily.

"And you know that there are no alternatives, Irene. I have no ways to protect all of you here and if I take you and the boys with me, I will be busy protecting you in London and leaving him alone here to fight a dragon with which he risks to burn himself" Mycroft says, in a determined but low tone of voice.

"But do you have a vague idea of the pain that would come to him? Do you think he's made of ice like you? Sherlock would be... devastated... I can not do this to him" she says, approaching to him, with her arms still crossed over her breasts, as if she wanted to protect herself from something terrible.

"You already did it Irene... you already made him believe you were dead..." Mycroft tells her, raising an eyebrow.

"How can you be so... stupid... to think it's the same thing," Irene exclaims in a voice full of anger, "he barely knew me, and even then, he was upset, how can you think that now, after all this, it could be the same thing to make him believe that I'm died... that his children are dead... you're crazy even just thinking about something like that" she says shaking her head, as if to delete what she heard.

"Okay... then convince him to abandon the case and return to London... immediately" Mycroft tells her with a tone of voice always cold but calm "but the truth is that you will not do it... you don't want to do it you can't do it... because you know that he is the only one who can stop those monsters and save those little girls" he then adds, watching Irene sit in front of him, her hands hiding her face and elbows resting on her legs.

"You know, Irene... I've never told you and you will not hear me say this anymore... but the truth is that I think you're really the only woman who can be close to him... because you're like him... and you are able to take even the most difficult decision, if you need to protect those you love and flush out a dragon," he still tells her, then silently looking at her.

Irene does not answer for several minutes and, when she looks up again at him, her eyes are shiny.

"He will hate me... he will hate me to death, he will never forgive me," she says, squeezing her hands together tightly.

"But he will be safe... you will be saved... your children will be saved and he will take that monster, saving dozens and dozens of girls from a nightmare life" Mycroft replies looking at her.

"He could not survive such a pain... do you realize that?" She asks him in a voice that is almost a whisper.

"He will do it instead and you know it... because it will be the rage to guide him and with that rage that dragon will not be able to escape him. You know it and I know it. We know him well, better than anyone else, and we know how he will react. As soon as it is all over, we will tell him the truth" he finally tells her, with that certainty that distinguishes him.

Irene listens to him and after a few minutes gets up nodding.

"He will kill me with his own hands," she whispers almost to herself, and pushing back the tears back, she lifts her shoulders, those damn hard shoulders on which she now seems to have to bear the weight of the whole world.


	16. Chapter 16

**New York - Chelsea - June 15, 2022 - 10.00 p.m.**

John still cannot believe it. He cannot believe what Sherlock told him. They are alive, Irene and the boys are alive and they are safe in a secret apartment under protection of Mycroft.

All a stunt, a stupid, incredible, for him useless staging, that he does not come to understand. He is happy to know that they are alive, but at the same time he is angry.

And he cannot imagine what Sherlock is feeling, now by his side in front of the door, where, on the top floor of this building, there is the apartment that his brother pointed to.

Throughout the journey, a quick ride on Pendergast's car that accompanied them, Sherlock did not say a word. He just looked in front of him and it is impossible to understand what he is thinking and feeling right now, because it looks like an ice statue. Pendergast left them, sensing that it was now a family matter they had to face alone. And John is part of this family. Damn, it is also his family and he suffered a lot in these three months, thinking they were dead. He would like to kill Mycroft, because it is certainly his idea, but it makes him angry the thought that she has accepted. How could she did such a thing?

They go up in silence to the top floor and with a quick step they walk down the corridor to the only door present.

Sherlock presses the bell long and hard, until the door opens and Mycroft appears.

"Get out of the way" are the first and only words that come out of Sherlock's throat and the tone is so cold that the brother moves immediately to let him in.

"They are in the billiard room," he says, simply pointing to a door on the other side of the huge atrium of this elegant attic.

Sherlock does not answer him and quickly crosses the hallway, throwing his coat on the ground as if to prevent his movements, and enters the room followed by John. Sitting on a sofa, on the left of the room, there are Miki and Mary and as they see him, they both stand up to meet him.

Sherlock does not think for a moment, he does not think about anything, because the only thing he wants now is to embrace them. He takes the little Mary and holds her by hiding his face in her neck, making her immediately laugh. He inhales the smell, the innocent and clean scent of his baby, and squeezes her tightly, while holding Miki with the other arm. It's something that rarely he does, but now it's the only thing he wants, squeezing them hard to himself and feeling that they're real, they are not just a projection in his mental palace.

"Sherlock, did the protection program work then? Could you find Isela and her sister?" Miki's voice interrupts the flow of his thoughts, and he guesses that the boy only knows that they were under protection. He just raises his eyes, crossing that of Mycroft, who is now before him, confirming him, with a nod of the head, of this hypothesis.

"Yes... it worked, I found them, they're fine, and in the next few days you'll be able to hear them" he says, ruffling his hair, a gesture that has not been done for a long time, because now Miki has grown up and starts not wanting be treated like a child. Mary laughs while he still holding her and only now, after he does not even know how much time, he decides to look across the hall.

Irene is standing near the pool table. She has not said a word since she saw him come in. She left that he was hugging his children and so she stood aside. The tension of these last three months is about to collapse on her, but she knows she can not afford it and remains so, standing and almost still, just a hand resting on the edge of the billiard table, as if it were to support herself.

She waits for him to decide to look at her, because he knows she is there, but he does not want to look at her, not yet. And when he does, his gaze so full of anger, of pain, almost makes her tremble. It's the only thing that makes her shake, the only reason that makes her eyes shine, that angry look directed at her. As had happened when he understood the trap in which she had dropped him. It was not because of the suffered defeat that her eyes were wet, it was because of the way he was looking at her, because that look is the reflection of her own gaze and she now hates herself for having felt compelled to deceive him again.

Sherlock looks at her for a long time without saying anything, then turns to John and delivers Mary to him.

"Please, John, take them there," he says in a deep voice, "go all the way," he then adds, looking at Mycroft.

John nods and brings also Miki to leave the room. He cannot speak almost, for the joy of seeing the two boys still alive and also their crazy mother, who now he would like to slap, but at this moment he does not envy her at all.

"Sherlock, it was my idea, anyway" Mycroft starts to say.

"Go out... out of this room!" Sherlock interrupts him with a tone of voice that almost frightens him.

Mycroft does not answer, he is accustomed to the hatred of the brother, even if in the end it is always a hatred and love that they feel for each other, and so he leaves the room by closing the door.

For whole minutes in the hall now it is hearing only Sherlock's heavy breathing. For whole minutes, he does not even look at her, and when he does he sees her still near the pool table.

"Do you realize... do you realize the hell you made me pass?" he tells her, in a voice that is just a whisper.

Irene does not answer, and, anyway, what she could ever answer. Sherlock approaches her a few steps, shaking a hand on the edge of the pool table.

"You made me believe you were dead... you made me believe that... my children were dead" he whispers slightly, and the hand that tightens the edge of the pool is losing color as much as he is putting us.

Irene looks at him and supports his gaze.

"I'm sorry... I'm sorry to have made you suffer so much... I know you will never forgive me" she says in a weak voice "but I'm not repented, Sherlock, I did not have solutions... We're not that kind of people... those that turn on the other side, you certainly aren't such a person... hate me... I understand it and accept it... beat me if it makes you feel better... but I have not regretted it... because Miki and Mary are safe... you are safe... those girls are safe and the dragon is beaten" she adds, sighing and supporting his look proudly, even if that look angry is hurting her more than the lashes she had suffered when she had been captured in Karachi.

Sherlock listens to her and does not answer for several minutes, then he takes a billiard ball and angrily throws it across the room, shattering the window of a piece of furniture.

"How can you think I can forgive you?" He now says, placing both hands on the table.

"I do not ask you to do it" she replies after a few minutes "I know you've spent three months of hell"

"Forty-five days" he interrupts her, and from his jacket pocket he pulls out her phone that slides on the green of the table to her hand. Irene looks at him and takes it.

"You found it," she says in a whisper.

"You wanted me to find it at some point... you always do... in the end your heart prevails over your head" and Sherlock remembers how he found it, attracted by a strange twinkle, a reflection of the fireplace's fire in the Pendergast villa library. And well hidden behind a picture, it was her phone with the battery and the SIM detached. She had not forgotten it, she had left it on purpose, because on that phone there are all their messages since he saved her to Karachi and she did not want to lose them. At that moment he understood everything, that it was all a staging, probably organized by Mycroft. He understood the meaning of her embrace, of those words that she had told him. Because she knew how much he could hate her, once he found out everything.

"I sent you a message... when it was still... in those first days," he says, continuing to look at the green of the table in front of him.

Irene opens the phone and reads the message he had sent. She closes her eyes for a moment, without being able to say anything. She puts the phone back on the table and looks back at him.

"What do we do now?" she asks with a sigh.

Sherlock lifts up and quickly he approaches her, clasping his hands around her neck.

"I should kill you with my hands... that's what I thought when I found your phone and in part I still think of it now" he says in an angry whisper "but the truth is that if I were in your place.. damn... I would have done the same thing" he adds then and before she can say anything, the hands pass over her face and he kisses her with an almost animal fury.


	17. Chapter 17

**New York -Riverside Drive - Pendergast Mason -16 June 2022 -12.30 a.m.**

The Pendergast mason is finally immersed in silence. Despite the late hour, Mary has struggled to fall asleep, perhaps because of the strong emotions she has felt around her, since Sherlock and John had joined them at Mycroft's penthouse. Irene let her stay with her father in the large library downstairs, until she saw her literally collapse and only then she took and brought her to the room upstairs, to place her in the crib next to Miki's bed.

Now the boy is asleep and she remains to watch them, enchanted by the serenity painted on their faces and that at this moment she almost envoys. She sighs, covering better Mary, who can't stay still even when sleeping, and turns off the light by closing the door behind her.

Downstairs the lights are off and the only lights on are those of Pendergast's room and their one, which is on the opposite side of the corridor. Slowly she sets off, the steps seem heavy. The emotions and tensions of the last three months, as of tonight, seem to her to still feel them all in the bones. And she knows that both she and Sherlock have yet to really face and overcome this moment. That anger that she felt in him has not really vented. Of course he understood, he understood her gesture, her motivations, but Irene knows well that the anger, for being pushed to believe them dead, is still there in his heart. Arriving in front of their room, she breathes deeply as if she were preparing to face a new trial and slowly opens the door.

Sherlock arranges clothes on a chair, after putting on his pajamas and looking at the bed, where Irene's nightgown sits on one side. In a moment he remembers those first cursed and long forty-five days in which he believed he could no longer see her, that the bed would remain empty at his side forever. That pain is something he will never forget, even if he closed it in a dark room in his mental palace. A double-locked lock that hopes never to open again.

He has spent the last few months with the only desire to finish that story as soon as possible, to be able to embrace his children, after realizing that they were still alive. But he never really stopped to think what would happen with Irene.

He was angry, still angry with her, but at the same time he knew it was the right thing to do. He can't hate her, he didn't hate her when the first time, years ago, she pretended to be dead, he didn't hate her when he found out how she had tricked him, to get the code key on her phone, he certainly can't hate her now, because he knows that every action has served to get the best result.

But he can't stop himself from being angry, because the deep and immense pain he has felt is as if it were lurking in the depths of his soul, like the magma of a dormant volcano just waiting to explode.

He lies on his back on the bed, crossing his hands behind his head and at that moment the door opens.

Irene, once inside, looks at him, standing still for a few moments, then without saying anything, she approaches the bed on her side to take her nightgown. Her blue eyes are reflected in the green ones of Sherlock and it is as if she understood every emotion of his at this moment. Without saying anything after a while she goes away to go to the bathroom.

The water from the shower coming from the bathroom is the only noise that can be heard throughout the villa, and Sherlock stays still in bed, staring at the ceiling until he sees her coming back. In silence he sees her lying down beside him, her face resting on the side of the pillow, her hair loose, one arm around her head and the other softly resting on her side. She is so beautiful, the body wrapped in the soft transparent shirt with thin straps, which highlights her forms, makes him vibrate instantly.

But that dull anger is still there, he feels it inside, it mixes with his own blood. He raises his green eyes on her face, crossing his gaze and sighs.

"If you're angry I understand" he hears her after a while.

"I know you understand that... but this does not make me feel better"

"You need to let off Sherlock... you kept everything inside"

Sherlock looks at her, narrowing his eyes slightly. Her gaze is firm, determined as always. Slowly he moves a hand from under his head and with his fingers he moves her shirt, uncovering a breast, and for a moment he remains to watch it.

He then returns with his eyes on her face and after a few moments sees her just nod, as if she had understood his silent question. Silently he approaches her, continuing to keep his gaze fixed on hers. With one hand he raises her shirt and with a single firm movement takes off her panties, almost tearing them away. He climbs up on her without undressing, opening her legs with his body, and grabs her hands by locking them above her head with one hand, while with the other he pulls down the trousers of his pajamas and without waiting any longer, without any preparation nor sweetness, he enters her with a single and decisive push.

Both remain still, the breath held back, the looks chained one in the other, until Sherlock begins to move with force, with an ever increasing rage, and every thrust is a pain that pulls away from that room in his mental palace, from his heart, from his soul, from his own blood, pouring it into her.

Irene follows his every move, understands his feelings, his fury, accepting it and absorbing it, pulling it away with her body as if it were a magnet.

They do not moan, they do not kiss, only heavy breaths are the only sound in the room.

Sherlock clenches her hands tightly, blocking them with his and feels the excitement mingle with rage, but more strongly he pushes, more he sinks in her, the more he feels the rage gradually fade and when it comes almost to the peak, he stops. The heavy breathing, the tense and trembling body, he looks at her, he reflects himself in those eyes so blue and intense, whose steady gaze does not fear anything.

"I can not... I can not do it so, Irene... so angrily... no," he whispers, catching his breath. "I... I love you... I can't hurt you... I don't want to hurt you," he adds, feeling his heart burst almost into his chest now that he said the words aloud for the first time.

Irene blinks her eyes several times and for the first time in months she feels the tension getting the better of her and the tears streaming her face.

"You can't... oh God Sherlock... your anger I understand and accept it ... but you can't... this... I hurt you so much" she whispers, turning her face as if to hide it from his eyes.

Sherlock leaves her hands without moving and takes her face forcing her to look at him.

"Stop it... stop scolding... you did not have a choice"

"I know... but this does not make me feel better"

"Then we'll find a way to get better," he says, starting to kiss her cheeks, wiping her tears with his lips, then kissing her eyes, the nose, her lips. He kisses her softly, caresses her lips with his, squeezes them just between his, licks them, until he meets her tongue and feels her moan and embrace him as the kiss deepens.

Irene responds to the kiss and when she hugs him, she feels the tension disappearing completely from her body, and the pleasure of squeezing him to herself, of feeling him inside her, finally, it takes over. Slowly she takes off his shirt and helping with her feet, she slipps off his pajama pants completely, then she lets slip off her nightgown, which she still wore, to feel their naked bodies against each other.

They move now with the same rhythm, slow, deep, almost unable to detach the lips from that kiss that is erasing three months of pain and tension for both. It's a sweet dance now, a single body that moves in perfect sync. There is no anger, no hurry, but only the pleasure of feeling again the skin of the other, the warmth of the other.

Sherlock feels the thoughts disappear completely and the mental palace vanish, as it always happens to him when he is with her, because now the only thing he feels is her scent, the taste of her lips, of her skin, the contractions of her body that tighten him, the warmth and that feeling of drowning in her, that he always feels. He clasps his hands around her waist as he kisses and bites her shoulder and when he feels her moan and almost crying his name, he dips his fingers into her hips and lets himself go to an orgasm by stifling the screams in her neck.

Exhausted and with the body still trembling, he finally collapses on her body, while Irene tightens him in the arms and legs, without allowing him to move. He then passes his hands under her body and slowly, trying to find his breath, he falls with her in a deep sleep, a sleep without nightmares and dragons, a sleep where the only sounds are those of their breaths and the only heat it is that of their bodies still united.


	18. Chapter 18

**London - Eaton Square - 20 June 2022 - 10.00 p.m.**

Getting back to the unhealthy but familiar London air was a cure for his lungs as well as his mind. He loves this city, loves the life that has been built here, a crazy but never monotonous life. He was so happy with his return to London that even Scotland Yard seemed better than he remembered, or perhaps less worse than anything else.

Sherlock spent the day between Molly's lab and Greg's office. No particular case to follow, he just needed to find and re-hunt his hunting camp. Instead, he spent the afternoon with Mary and Miki. It was not easy to explain to the boy what really happened, Irene's choice. But he seems to have understood, he maybe understands them two better than anyone else.

Mary has made her second year of life for fifteen days and already seems bigger, or at least more uncontrollable. She can't sit still for more than five minutes and now she starts running everywhere, risking to drop everything she meets on her path. The games that normally use children at her age seem already outdated for her.

Sherlock now watches her sleep in her bed and wonders how much he can teach her to play chess, probably soon. He smiles at her and bends over to kiss her on that little head already full of dark curls. He checks that the intercom is working and turns off the light by opening the door of the room.

From the corridor he sees the light of Miki's lighted room and approaches to greet him. The boy is sitting on the bed and looking at his smartphone whose display is off.

"Everything good?" He asks entering.

"Mmm... yes... everything is fine" Miki replies, looking up at him.

Sherlock nods and turns as if to go out.

"Sherlock... you... you... how did you do it?" Miki stops him with an uncertain tone.

"Explain better," he replies, coming back to him.

"You and Irene... I know that for a long time you were far away... well... how did you do it?" Miki asks him again.

"Oh... I see... Well, actually... I did not do anything... she did everything... you know, she's a tremendously stubborn woman" Sherlock replies, raising his eyes to the sky and making him smile "but if I can give you some advice... do not do like me Miki... do not waste time... if you want to call and hear her ... just do it" he adds, smiling and before leaving the room he sees him turn on the phone and dial a number.

He finally reaches their room. Irene is combing sitting in front of the mirror. Without saying anything, Sherlock undresses and wears his pajamas and then lies on his back, his arms folded behind his head.

After a few minutes Irene reaches him. She wears a simple night gown with thin straps, but she could be seductive to his eyes even dressed in a work overalls.

"Did you talk to him?" She asks, lying at his side, her head resting on the palm of his hand.

"Yes... I think he's calling her now," he replies.

"And tomorrow will you do that speech we talked about?" she still asks, smiling.

"Yes... I have also prepared a series of sex education texts that he can read, and we will approach the question from a scientific point of view... which is what I have done".

"Yes... I guess" Irene answers giggling "Okay let's do this... you take care of the scientific part... I'll take care of the rest," she adds, continuing to smile.

"Yes... it will be better," he tells her with a sigh, then glancing across her body. "You know, I deserve to have some special awards... I'm still a bit angry," he adds with a slightly sly smile.

"But really, I think I'm the one who needs some special prize, you know," Irene says, arching an eyebrow.

"And why ever?"

"Are you kidding? Three whole months, twenty-four hours a day with your brother struggling with our daughter?" Irene answers with an ironic, amused smile.

"Oh God... I think this is a proof that maybe I would not be able to survive," he says, laughing before luring her to him, before kissing her and thinking again that, when the time will come, that's how he wants to leave life, kissing her and laughing with her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here we are at the end. Tell me the truth, did I scare you? Did you really believe that Irene and the boys were dead? If yes, then it means that the story has worked, and if you have nevertheless arrived to the end, well thank you, I am honored. 
> 
> This however is not the last one. I'm writing another one and it will soon be over and it will really be the last of this series. 
> 
> When I have finished writing it, I will also begin to translate it. 
> 
> Thanks to everyone and every comment for me is vital, because it pushes me and stimulates me to continue.


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